Learning from students: An inquiry into Charles Spearman’s research agenda.

Charles Spearman is somewhat of an enigmatic figure in psychology's history. While most historians of psychology agree that he made notable contributions, there is no consensus about the research agenda from which his contributions originated. Since typical methods for studying a researcher's agenda provide relatively limited information in the case of Spearman, we approached the problem differently. Under the reasoned assumption that the student research projects he guided would manifest his agenda, we examined the content of those projects. What emerged from our inquiry is a research agenda that appears broader and more complex than what is often presented in modern history of psychology texts. We discuss some implications of our findings as well as some possible future directions for historical inquiry into Spearman. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).